


Mother's Day

by breathewords



Category: Riverdale (TV 2017)
Genre: Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Post-Season 2, always ignoring the Archie arrest plot line, because I want to, because all my stories are angst, no off topic questions, so it's okay, we love a happy ending, with a happy ending
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-23
Updated: 2018-06-23
Packaged: 2019-05-27 04:31:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,441
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15016724
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/breathewords/pseuds/breathewords
Summary: He’s praying for the day to end, thinking about how he’s almost made it through, when he feels his phone buzz from its place in his pocket. And he checks it, because he thinks it might be her, so he can’t not. When he sees her name light up the screen, his heart stops and he asks to be excused.





	Mother's Day

**Author's Note:**

> Welcome to the next installment of "Alyssa writes exclusively angst!" Assuming Mother's Day is shortly after the season finale. Because they have to be almost done with 10th grade at this point, right? Feedback is always very much appreciated :)

Jughead hasn’t spoken to his mother in several months.

He tried not to be spiteful toward her. He tried not to blame her for leaving him behind when things with his dad got too bad. He tried to tell himself she did what was best for Jellybean. He’s glad his sister is safe in a warm house with enough to eat and a loving mother and grandparents. He’s glad.

But after Gladys blew him off when he tried to get out of Riverdale after FP’s arrest, it got a lot harder. He had never asked much of her. He didn’t ask for attention all those days she spent trying to get Jellybean not to cry instead of playing with him. He didn’t ask for silence all those nights she kept him up yelling. He didn’t ask for money when he was homeless and living off of Pop Tate’s generosity with “leftovers.”He asked for her to be there for him _once_ , when he thought his father was a murderer and his girlfriend was a liar and his best friend betrayed him and he felt like he had absolutely no other option besides getting far, far away from Riverdale. And she said no.

So he decides he’s not going to wish her a happy Mother’s Day this year. He’ll spend the day with Mary Andrews, who’s still in town after extending her stay to deal with Archie’s… legal situation with Hiram Lodge. Historically, he’s always spent the holiday with the Andrews family, anyway. They basically raised him. Not his own parents.

It doesn’t mean he won’t also spend the day with his thumb hovering over the phone icon next to his mother’s contact information. It doesn’t mean he won’t flinch every time Archie tells his mom he loves her, and she looks at him like he could do no wrong. Like no matter how many times she has to leave him, she’ll always come back, and her door will always be open. Like she’d never turn him away if he called her in tears from a payphone in the middle of the winter.

They’re sitting at dinner, and he finds himself looking away, staring at his plate, the wall, the ground, more often than he’s making eye contact with his quasi-family. He doesn’t even show his usual enthusiasm toward Mary’s delicious cooking. Of course, he’s sure to complement her, but honestly, the food tastes like nothing tonight, and it sticks in his throat. He’s praying for the day to end, thinking about how he’s almost made it through, when he feels his phone buzz from its place in his pocket.

And he checks it, because he thinks it might be her, so he can’t not.

When he sees her name light up the screen, his heart stops and he asks to be excused. He’s out the door before he hears Fred actually tell him to take the call.

“Mom?”

“Hi, Jughead.”

And it’s her voice, he’s sure of it, even though it’s been a while since he’s heard it, in his dreams or elsewhere.

“Why… why are you calling?”

He forgets about Mother’s Day. He forgets about how much he hates her. He forgets about how much he misses her.

“I spoke with your dad a few weeks ago,” she starts.

A few weeks ago, when FP was trying to get him to move to Toledo. So he wasn’t bluffing.

“You were really gonna let us come live with you?” Jughead asks incredulously, effectively cutting her off.

“I was worried about you. Your father said you were in trouble. You’re my son. I —”

“Right. You were worried about me, but not worried enough to come see me. Not worried enough to ask _me_ how I was instead of dad…”

“Jughead! I love you. I was trying to do what was right for our family. Your grandparents… you know how they feel about FP… they wouldn’t have taken me and Jellybean in if you’d have come.”

“What family? You ruined our family when you left me and dad. So don’t pretend like you care now because you’re feeling guilty I could have died without you clearing your conscious.”

He knows he’s being harsh. Knows it in his tone of voice, knows it in the way his mom is at a loss for words, knows it in the way his fingers tighten around his phone while he waits for a reply that never comes. An apology she’ll never be able to give.

“You didn’t check on me after you left. You didn’t try to stay in touch. That _hurt_ , mom. It hurt more than anything dad might have told you happened to me, which he shouldn’t have, by the way.”

“I thought hearing from me would just make things worse.”

“I doubt anything could have made it worse. Don’t call me again.”

He hangs up and his phone clatters to the pavement. He gets on his motorcycle and drives, not caring about where he’s going or what he’s leaving behind.

* * *

He doesn’t make it very far before tears start to cloud his vision and he’s forced to pull over on Sweetwater Bridge. It’s dark out, so naturally, everyone in Riverdale is locked inside. Everyone in this town is still fearing for their lives, and maybe he should, too. Maybe he would, except his sense of self preservation seems to have gotten lost somewhere along the way. Maybe the Gholies beat it out of him, or maybe the Serpents did. Maybe he left it behind at the drive-in, or the storage closet at Riverdale High. Maybe his mom took it with her. It doesn’t matter now. He’s the only one out after dark, and dangerous or not, he’s glad for it. He leans his head against his handlebars and focuses on slowing his breathing until he hears sneakers smacking the pavement. He looks up, and sure enough, Archie’s found him.

“Hey,” Archie says, nodding his head.

“Hey,” Jughead says back, and he can’t help but roll his eyes, even though Archie’s being nice.

“What was that about?”

“Dear old mother decided it was finally time to get in touch, I guess.”

“Shit,” Archie says. “Did she say why?”

“Not exactly, but I assume it has something to do with the fact that my dad told her I was recently hospitalized.”

Archie’s silent for a change.

“She sure took her sweet time, though,” Jughead tries to joke.

“You didn’t want to talk,” Archie says unnecessarily.

“I told her not to call me back.”

“Jug…”

“Don’t say it, Arch. I know I’m an asshole, okay?”

“I was going to say that she shouldn’t have even tried to call without knowing you were ready to talk.”

“Maybe.”

“So where were you heading, exactly.”

“Home, I guess. We’ve got about as many Serpents as the trailer can hold, so I should probably get in line for a shower.”

“Just stay over my place. I’ve got a shower.”

“Okay, Arch,” Jughead says, too drained to put up a fight he knows Archie will insist on winning.

They ride back to the Andrews’s on Jughead’s motorcycle, Archie trying to maintain his manliness the whole way by touching Jughead as little as possible.

“Shit. Are your parents pissed at me for running out?” Jughead asks when they pull up a few minutes later.

“Nah, they’re probably just eating dessert. Mom made a pie. Want some?”

“Maybe later,” Jughead lies.

He heads upstairs, purposefully avoiding looking into the kitchen. In the shower, he turns the hot water on full blast and stands under the spray until he feels guilty for running up the Andrews’s water bill. And guilty for taking advantage of their hospitality in general. Guilty for hanging up on his mom and guilty for not being enough for her. Guilty for a million things he’s having a hard time convincing himself aren’t his fault. He gets dressed and goes downstairs to say his goodbyes, hands deep in his pockets and eyes on the floor as he mumbles his way through an apology.

Archie chases him out the door, and he’s feeling less sardonic and more raw, so he doesn’t attempt to be funny or even nice.

“What, Archie!? I’m not in the mood for video games, okay?”

“Stop doing this! You don’t have to be on your own!”

“Maybe I want to be! Did that ever occur to you?”

“I know you, and you don’t! And don’t act like that’s your only option.” Archie’s got Jughead by the lapels of his leather jacket, and looks him directly in the eye to say, “I know what it’s like to have your mom leave you, too.”

“Yeah, except the difference is yours comes back for you!”

Jughead pushes Archie off, and the force of the shove sends him stumbling into the stone wall separating his driveway from Betty’s. The sound of rocks hitting concrete echoes down the block, competing with Jughead and Archie’s yelling. Their voices get louder and louder as they yell insults back and forth, and they only shut up when Betty runs out her front door.

Then she’s standing between them and Jughead’s heart skips a beat like it does every time he sees her, except he can’t really see her, because the gash on his forehead left by Penny’s dirty knife has opened back up, and his other eye is still a little swollen, and now all he really sees is blood. And Betty’s telling Archie to go home and Fred and Mary are opening the door and Betty is pushing Jughead backwards into her own house while he tries to stop the bleeding on his forehead with the leather sleeve of his jacket.

Alice is in the kitchen and immediately gets motherly when she sees him bleeding, her fondness for him having only increased after he helped them with Chic and she reconnected with his father a little bit. Betty lets Alice fetch the first aid kit, but then mercifully leads Jughead up to her room to handle his wound herself.

“Sit,” she tells him, and he does, fists still clenched and trembling.

How could Archie possibly think their situations are comparable? He’d been practically throwing Mary in Jughead’s face all day, and then he says she left him? Doesn’t he see that she came back, and that made all the difference? Because people come back for Archie. Because he’s good and kind and pure and worth coming back for. And Jughead just… isn’t.

Betty stops the bleeding, cleans his face, and replaces the butterfly stitches as he spirals deeper into self-loathing.

“What happened?” She asks when she’s satisfied that he won’t bleed out on her bed.

“Just a stupid fight,” he says automatically.

“Don’t do that, Jug. Talk to me.”

“My mom called,” he says.

“What?”

“I guess my dad really did try to get her to let us move to Toledo, and she finally decided she’d check in on me. Except I didn’t really react the way she hoped.”

“She has no right to hope you’ll react any particular way, Jughead. You don’t owe her anything.”

“I just… yelled at her. And I yelled at Archie. And now I’m bothering you when you should be with your mom…”

“You’re not ‘bothering’ me.”

“I am,” he says, pushing up off her bed, desperately trying to dig himself out of this hole but only falling deeper and deeper in. He paces her room, obsessively running his hands through his hair, and the words just start falling out. He couldn’t stop them if he tried. He tells her about the day his mom left, about how his dad had gotten drunk and violent and she couldn’t take it anymore. About how he had woken up to find her and Jellybean driving away. About how he tried to chase the car, knowing they weren’t coming back. About how he tried to stay at home and keep an eye on his dad, but eventually got fed up too. About how he blamed himself for not being able to keep his family together, for his father’s alcoholism, for every fracture in his friendship with Archie, for every rough patch the Serpents have endured since he was inducted, for how Fangs almost died, for how the rest of the gang followed him into Hiram’s trap, for how he wasn’t there for her when her dad was being arrested.

It’s not cathartic. The weight on his shoulders just increases, until he’s literally buckling under it.

And then Betty’s on her knees next to him, one arm around his shoulders, one hand gripping his forearm as he puts his face in his hands and cries.

“You’re okay, you’re okay, it’s not your fault,” she repeats, but it’s halfhearted, because she blames herself for things out of her control as well.

He’d be embarrassed, but he’s too drained to feel much of anything. The tears don’t last long, anyway. They never do with him. He doesn’t have the luxury.

“Remember when I asked you if evil could be passed down, and you told me no?” He nods. “Remember what you asked me?”

“I asked if you believed me,” he says, voice rough and barely above a whisper.

“Right. And I told you I did. I looked into your eyes, and I knew you were seeing the best in me. But I also knew you were being honest. So look at me now, and believe me when I tell you are the most selfless, good-hearted man I know. You have so much to offer everyone around you. Your mother didn’t leave because of you, and it’s her loss every day she doesn’t come back to you. You and Archie are going to fight. Veronica and I do. It’s normal. And you can’t control the Serpents, even if you are their king. So you have to stop blaming yourself. You’re doing your best, Jug. And that’s good enough for me. Hell, it’s more than I thought I’d ever have. I love you so much, and I’m not going anywhere anytime soon. And I’ll always come back to you, no matter what.”

The vice around his chest loosens a little as he studies her face. Her thumbs stroke the bags under his eyes and he catches her hand, closing his eyes and leaning into her palm. She’s left him before. But he’s also left her. And they’ve found their way back to one another. So he must be doing something right. Whatever he’s doing, it’s enough for her. And really, that’s what matters most.

So when she asks him if he believes her, he tells the truth.

He does.


End file.
